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Interactive display system with indicia readerRelated Patent Categories: Registers, Coded Record Sensors, Particular Sensor StructureInteractive display system with indicia reader description/claimsThe Patent Description & Claims data below is from USPTO Patent Application 20070034694, Interactive display system with indicia reader. Brief Patent Description - Full Patent Description - Patent Application Claims
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION [0001] This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/647,063, filed Jan. 26, 2005, the entire disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference FIELD OF THE INVENTION [0002] The present invention relates generally to display devices of a type often used in retail, commercial, trade show and similar environments. DISCUSSION OF THE RELATED ART [0003] Many products sold in commerce are displayed to potential consumers or others using product samples. Some product samples are miniaturized versions of an actual product. Other product samples are individual units of the actual product. Yet other product samples are full-size pieces of only a small portion of an actual product. Flooring products are one example of products often displayed using this latter type of product sample. Exemplary flooring products include carpeting, ceramic tiles, hardwood floors, modular laminate composition floors, and vinyl or other sheet flooring goods. Such products typically have a visually repeating pattern. Product samples used in retail, wholesale, trade show or other displays are typically relatively small in size (e.g. less than four square feet in area) so as to be easily manageable, and to facilitate storage and display of multiple different patterns, colors, textures, or other options in a relatively small amount of display space. By way of example, such product samples are often displayed for sale on shelves, racks, or pivotably mounted frames. Bricks, paving stones, flagstones, fabrics, paint color samples, countertop surfacing products, kitchen cabinets, shades, blinds, and the like are often displayed in similar displays and/or in a similar sample-based manner. [0004] Typically, the product samples are removable from such conventional displays for closer inspection by a buyer or other interested party ("interested party"). However, such closer inspection is often unsuitable or inadequate in assisting an interested party in fully appreciating and/or visualizing the product in its intended actual form (e.g., on a kitchen floor measuring 12 feet by 22 feet), or in a setting similar thereto (e.g., a room-sized environment). [0005] Some flooring manufacturers have adopted the use of interactive, computer-based, multi-media displays to assist potential customers. For example, Mannington Mills, Inc. of Salem, N.J. has developed a website at Mannington.com having a Floor Finder feature that allows a computer user to use a keyboard and/or mouse to provide typed and/or selected input for a product name, product number or product characteristics as search terms to identify and view on the web site a color image of a small portion (e.g. an image of a 2 foot square) of a selected flooring product. However, this requires that the interested party have or have access to a computer and network connection, and further requires the interested party to have and/or use typing, clicking, and/or other computer skills, which can be particularly undesirable, time consuming, intimidating and/or unwelcoming for some individuals. Further, this system fails to provide the interested party with an aid for visualizing the product in a form greater than the product sample. SUMMARY [0006] The present invention provides an interactive display capable of providing an interested party with a visual aid for visualizing a product in a form greater than the product sample, namely an image of the product in a form greater than that of the product sample, e.g. larger in size, including a greater portion and/or number of repeating pattern elements, as installed in an actual room, or displayed in another appropriate visual context. Further, the display permits an interested party to interact with the display to obtain such a visual aid without any need for his/her own computer or network connection, and without the need for any computer skills. [0007] The interactive display is preferably provided in free-standing kiosk form that includes computerized and other hardware for reading RFID tags, bar codes, or similar identifying indicia. A display system including an inventive display kiosk may further include a conventional product sample rack for displaying multiple different product samples, each of which is provided with a respective RFID tag, bar code or similar indicia that can be read by the kiosk, so that the kiosk may retrieve from a computerized database image, text or other information stored in memory in association with an identification code read from the RFID tag, bar code or similar indicia, and display such information on a video display screen, etc. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS [0008] The present invention will now be described by way of example with reference to the following drawings in which: [0009] FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an exemplary free-standing display kiosk in accordance with the present invention; [0010] FIGS. 2, 3 and 4 are perspective views of exemplary conventional product sample racks of a type generally known in the art, the displays supporting product samples configured in accordance with the present invention; [0011] FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an exemplary PC in accordance with the present invention; [0012] FIG. 6 is another perspective view of the exemplary display kiosk of FIG. 1; [0013] FIG. 7 is a rearview of the exemplary display kiosk of FIG. 1; and [0014] FIG. 8 is a flow diagram illustrating exemplary operation of the display kiosk of FIG. 1. DETAILED DESCRIPTION [0015] Referring now to FIGS. 1-3, the present invention provides a novel, specially configured interactive display 100 (FIG. 1) that includes electronic hardware and/or software capable of reading information identifying a physical object, such as a product sample, in automated fashion from an identifying indicia provided on the object, e.g. via a separate identification tag attached to the object. The interactive display 100 is further configured to use the information read from the product sample, etc. to retrieve product or related information from a computerized database. Such information may include image, text or other information stored in memory in association with the information read from the identification. The interactive display 100 is further configured to display/present such information on a video display screen, speakers, etc. Accordingly, a shopper, without a PC or sophisticated electronics, may physically remove a specially configured product sample from a conventional display rack, bring it to the interactive display, and have information about the product displayed to the shopper. This arrangement is particularly useful in trade show, retail and wholesale environments. [0016] In a preferred embodiment, the identification tag includes a radio frequency identification (RFID) tag attached to the product sample. However, the identification tag may have various forms, and any suitable form may be used. For example, the identification tag may include a bar code, and the kiosk may be configured with an optical bar code scanner, etc. for reading information from bar codes. Alternatively, the identification tag may have textual indicia, and the interactive display may be configured with an optical scanner and optical character recognition software, etc. For illustrative purposes only, the present invention is discussed below in the context of an RFID-based system for use with product samples in a commercial environment. [0017] Referring again to FIG. 1, the exemplary interactive display 100 includes a platform 102 for supporting a specially configured product sample 50. The platform 102 is preferably mounted to a housing of the display 100 in a substantially horizontal orientation to facilitate supporting of a product sample. The product sample 50 is specially configured in accordance with the present invention to include attached thereto an identification tag, such as a conventional RFID tag 52. Such RFID tags are well known in the art in any suitable RFID tag may be used. In accordance with the present invention, the RFID tag 52 is selected and/or configured to be: (1) compatible with an RFID interrogator of the display 100; and (2) carrying information for, or otherwise being capable of, identifying the attached product sample. [0018] In general, a conventional RFID tag functions in response to a coded RF signal received from a base station/interrogator. Typically, the tag reflects the incident RF carrier back to the interrogator. Information is transferred back to the interrogator as the reflected signal is modulated by the tag according to its programmed information protocol. Continue reading about Interactive display system with indicia reader... 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